THE OTHERS

a stoopy shits

2011-07-21T20:59:00.000-05:00

see, when you

hate

the truth is realized

in accurate measurements,

dissected in fine lines,

indubitably.

I liked that

then,

no errors

but now i like it kinda blurry.

if there were thirteen more syllables,

all this crap could be four haiku.

and the last line would be this.

exactly one untitled haiku & a photograph.

2011-07-07T20:57:00.003-05:00

BIF BAM POW BITCHES
ALL UP IN YR GRILL & SHIT
HOW YOU LIKE ME NOW?

2 haiku for vic.

2011-06-25T20:14:00.002-05:00

DARLING I LOVE YOU
BUT GIVE ME PARK AVENUE
I'M ZSA ZSA GABOR

***

NEW YORK IS WHERE I'D
RATHER STAY, GET ALLERGIC
SMELLING HAY - zsa zsa

***

[remember when i went & pulled the punchline to a joke off of my book shelf?.....well.....vic does]

a short one from ze fake dada.

2011-06-25T20:05:00.002-05:00

it took about
30 seconds
for my eyes
to adjust
to the darkness

but when they did

man, it was
worth it

untitled short piece.

2011-06-13T20:29:00.000-05:00

that shit
was so bad,
that the protesters
had protesters

BRAIN DAMAGED HAIKU.

2011-06-11T23:32:00.001-05:00

i drank the kool aid
either trippin' or dyin'
jim jones acid test

another untitled nothin'.

2011-06-11T18:15:00.001-05:00

i laid down
in the shower
like a murder victim
with john coltrane's
"sun ship"
acting as my
soundtrack

Yup

2011-05-20T18:03:00.000-05:00

takin' me a trip

tomorry 'bout 6 o'clock

see you sumbitches...

don't pay to get 'em on the same haiku..

2011-05-01T19:58:00.001-05:00

female underwear-
fantastical umbrella...

makes fer a nice hat.

Workin'

2011-05-01T17:47:00.002-05:00

Another day is come
like yesterday and yesterday and yesterday
last week, last month
year upon slow year.
Long seamless days
constant peristalsis with no release.

I used to hope for a better future.
Now I just hope to get done early.

This slow dying isn't killing me fast enough.
Thirty more years of this
and I can shuffle
meekly off to the grave
my bastard life done
the fruits of my labors
safely tucked away
in another man's bank account.

1 haiku.

2011-04-30T21:17:00.000-05:00

waiting for ze day
we can say what we need to
without consequence.

dos [equis] haiku.

2011-01-22T00:24:00.001-06:00

ima kill the cold
with a heat knife in my hand
disney on ice....gone.

***

pluto can suck it
like there is no tomorrow
just ask mickey mouse.

***

photographicals of batman.

2011-01-16T16:38:00.003-06:00

we were in 5th grade, the little boy was younger.

2011-01-05T00:25:00.003-06:00

just seen a scene from
an episode of "our gang"

[aka - little rascals]

had a little boy
standing in front of
the classroom &
he's singing a song

[& honestly, it's
very very strange]

but

this scene made me
think of another scene

one where this kid
named donny bayless
that i went to school with
stood up in front of our class &
proceeded to tell "nigger" jokes
as his project for the part of
our music class that covered
performin' in front of folks

donny bayless also once
broke into my house
& stole a decent sized chunk
of me & my dad's
baseball card collection

i still hate donny bayless.

the clam just said this, so i did this here tardo haiku with it.

2010-12-24T23:08:00.002-06:00

i am borderline
should i put myself on some
fuckin' lithium.

haiku just for yoo hoo.

2010-12-24T22:42:00.001-06:00

pretentious assholes
are something we hate alot
so shut the fuck up.

haiku broadcast from the pawn shoppe.

2010-12-24T09:11:00.001-06:00

we are the center
of the fucking universe
long live everyone.

el stupido haiku.

2010-12-22T19:53:00.001-06:00

my name is simon
& i like to do drawings
because i can't read.

homerun

2010-12-01T21:42:00.000-06:00

I crunched across the white gravels to the old house. It was green-yellow shadow dusk. It was warm enough for crickets.

I stood at the kitchen screen door, slick with honeysuckle & sassafras & grass & cotton sheets floating on the clothesline.

I looked in. Ceiling lamp incandescence coated the room with that marvelous warmish amber that I can never steal with camera, but say sometimes. There was no vodka or screaming or pistol shot-bloody tears here.

I squeaked the door open and stepped in. The floor flickered from another room. She was to my left, finishing the supper dishes.

She was not startled. She knew who I was. She dried her hands and glided to me. “Why are you here? You don’t belong here.”

I looked down into her face. She was so beautiful. Her hair was swept red flame. Her Celt-green eyes had no dread or loathing or jade.

“I had to come here, mama. It’s all dead there. Nobody thinks about anything but nothing. So everybody moves real fast to try to prove something. And it ain’t even there to prove.”

She put fingers on my lips. She knew.

“Shush. They might hear you.” She pointed at the flickering floor. I followed.

There was a man in an easy chair. There were children scattered about the furniture and floor over bowls of ice cream. They giggled in time from something coming from the flickering B&W TV.

I smiled. I turned back to her. I whispered.

“I wish I’d brought my camera.”

She touched my arm.

“You have to go now. You don’t belong here.”

“Yes’m.”

I crunched on the gravels. “Mama...” I turned back to the screen door. She wasn’t there. I talked to the house.

“I was just gonna say, ‘Don’t drink vodka, if you can help it...’”

turkey-ku.

2010-11-25T11:43:00.001-06:00

cram, shove, eat, shit, sleep
dionysus, indulgence
happy turkey day.

Who can argue with that

2010-11-12T12:37:00.004-06:00

entwistle proved it
you don't have to go pretty
die like a rock star.

***

just short of sixty
strippers, piles of cocaine
bad motherfucker.

top by yossarian,
bottom by fake dada.

2010-11-10T20:34:00.001-06:00

'LOL'

Gayness

2010-11-05T21:06:00.001-05:00

“But really, asshole,” she screamed, “Tell me the truth!! WHY do you want to get rid of me?!? Are you fuckin’ GAY?!?!”

She was midway through the experience of becoming my ex-wife; she yelled at me more every time we talked, with some new kind of off-balance accusation. The fact that she’d blown some cross-eyed dude in a bar while she was in Denver never entered into her thinking- this shit MUST be a character flaw on MY part. The NERVE of me kickin’ her ass to the curb...

I grinned. “Well, ya know, bein’ gay ain’t really a character flaw.”

She looked puzzled for a moment, then her brow twisted up. “AHA! So you ARE fuckin’ GAY!”

My grin got bigger. “Well, no, I don’t think so. Far as I know, I ain’t never got all hot and bothered thinkin’ about dicks and such.”

Her face said she wanted to grab something heavy and bludgeon me with it. Her fingers clenched up.

“But I’ll tell ya what,” I said, “Now that you mention it, it’d be a hell of a lot easier bein’ gay....”

“Dude.”

“Dude?”

“Dude. Pass me the remote. Wanna get nekkid and bump nasties?”

“Dude. Totally. But wait...shouldn’t we get all dressed up and go blow a couple hundred on dinner, dancing, and a movie or something? Maybe a walk on the beach?”

“Dude. Fuck that. You know we just wanna get nekkid and bump nasties. Don’t be such a girly.”

“Dude. Fuckin’ A Right. Sorry.”

no title as of yet.....

2010-10-16T21:05:00.002-05:00

the first time i ever heard sid vicious sing "my way" i was 16 yrs old & on some fairly decent lsd.

as we walked into the music store, i realized the overhead speakers & my brain were simultaneously at an all time high.

my brain said no to all of it & within 2 minutes i was back outside.

2010-10-10T21:24:00.004-05:00

the rough good poets

hide behind whisky

maybe sex, love, brain

all those

me,

a grainy field

gray photograph

wind chime

place

the boy

still fetchin’

speckled

pheasant eggs.

whistling theme songs.

2010-10-08T09:52:00.003-05:00

about gave myself
a headache
tryin' to whistle

for some reason
i couldn't remember
how it went,
& each time i thought that i
had it figgered out,
some other song would
come out in it's place

usually that mistaken somethin' was

to which i would say
"god damnit......that ain't it"

the other mistake that kept
shootin' out my mouth was

i say "shit.....god damn"

& if i remember correctly,

somehow slipped out,
& that's just fucked up.

throw that notebook of rapid eye movement into the fireplace.

2010-10-02T17:45:00.001-05:00

flashes of dreamscape
300 words of that shit
& shit's gettin' broke.

as nature intended.

2010-09-23T22:18:00.002-05:00

RAINBOW SHOOTING OUT
OF MOTHER NATURE'S ASSHOLE
HOW'S THAT FOR NATURE?

dedicated to the memory of michael grover's conversation that died.

gangster - ku.

2010-09-13T12:13:00.002-05:00

pulled out my choppa
shoved it up against his dome
demanded his $$$.
***

i'm sure there will be more to come.

much love,
fake dada

Some Sooz

2010-08-17T17:34:00.002-05:00

'I got drunk at an open mic night last night, and did some sketches.
very much musical and vocal talent there. amazing....t'was cool.' - Sue

some bad tarded shit-ku, but pbr did fly out his nose. [so his says]

2010-08-15T01:56:00.001-05:00

LOW EXPECTATIONS
ARE KEY TO MY SURVIVAL
SAID YOSSARIAN.

somethin' about food & convenience.

2010-08-06T13:00:00.002-05:00

captain 'tardo
gave himself a
lazy man lunch
that consisted of
a spoonful of apple jelly
plopped directly into a
container of crunchy peanut butter
that only had a little bit of
peanut butter left in it

then he ate it
with said spoon
right out of
the container

belly slightly filled,
& just a dirty spooon

didn't even have to
waste a paper plate.

the name of this poem is fuck you

2010-08-03T22:04:00.001-05:00

i’ve scourged a patch

with my pissing.

my lungs,

in this case,

are just as bad as cancer-

eat and kill

the host

yeah,

chew yourself to death.

take a smell

the three august raindrops

are cooking on the asphalt,

the whores of the used surfaces

scrape, rake

sepulchre.

i don’t want this

to be another lesson.

2010-08-01T15:00:00.001-05:00

they call ‘em ZZ

that lil’ ol’ band from Tejas...

fuckers used to rock

my friends all told me

somethin gonna change my life

brown sugar, baby

just got paid today

got a pocketful of change

just got paid today

*********

you cain’t haul vittles

down the internet highway

ya goddam idjit

*bill*

i, personally

have eat more puksy than ya’ll

more than there is. shit.

**********

vocabulary

is all fuckin’ good and shit

but words is better

i sent somebody

a fuckin’ haiku thingie

it weren’ you, were it?

bein’ in a ‘zine

gives me a big ol’ stiffy

for a breath or two

critiquing folk’s words

be tantamount to self-sex

write, motherfucker

**********

git yer big hair on

and let them kick drums bludgeon

the whole day away

culture of cowtown

is rapidly replaced by

culture of calschlock

sometimes september

sprinkles just enough rain down

for one more mowin’

fuck disappointment

fuck a buncha damn mistakes

and fuck perfection

2010-07-31T13:05:00.001-05:00

Weave Time

2010-07-31T12:58:00.002-05:00

Poles and 'Franks'

a short rant

2010-07-24T20:50:00.004-05:00

I don't know much about much, but I know about working for a living. I know that if you visit any blue-collar grind, you'll find hollow-eyed exhausted people who believe work is necessary and important... even noble. They have to believe that. Otherwise they start counting up the years spent breaking themselves on the wage-slave rack, ruining their knees and their backs, trading their best years for a paltry paycheck, a few mean crumbs from their overlord's groaning table. Too much of that kind of reflection and one day the headlines scream of yet another workplace rampage, well-coiffed television personalities gushing breathlessly over the body count in between commercial breaks. Disgruntled employees are always filed under "deranged" or "psychopathic." The clarity that leads one to stalk his boss with a high-powered rifle is deliberately misunderstood. To do otherwise would be to invite carnage to retail outlets, offices, and what few manufacturing facilities remain. So the "deranged psychopath" meme is carefully fed to the toiling masses in easy to digest soundbites. They nod soberly before resuming their scutwork, but if you look carefully into their eyes, you can see a troubled doubt, just a glimmer that's soon gone, but it was there. They know something is dreadfully wrong with their lives, but they blame themselves. If only they'd tried harder in school. If only they'd chosen a different military specialty. If only they'd taken night classes. Their corporate masters keep the screws turned tight so that doubt is never directed at them, its rightful target. The real tragedy is that we don't have more corporate massacres.

a haiku.

2010-07-22T11:58:00.000-05:00

OUTLAW BEHAVIOR
WILL GET YOU FUCKIN' NOWHERE
IF IT AIN'T DONE RIGHT.

2010-07-15T21:09:00.001-05:00

"Stogie Madonna."

A Gypsy caravan tumbles into the canal, just short of the Swiss Alps. The only thing that stands in its way, is the smouldering ruins of the 2012 London Olympics. The Queens face looks on, semi suspended from the Millennium Eye, overlooking the still burning multinational flagpole assemblage farce. A cloud of nostril clogging burnt fat smoke hangs heavy and motionless, pointing a guilty finger at the piles of still spitting charred corpses.

by Chops.

some haiku.

2010-07-15T20:33:00.002-05:00

he jerked off during
sunday morning service &
god hates him for it.
***
we are just vessels
for ze cancerous goodies
god has given us.
***

none title.

2010-07-04T00:22:00.002-05:00

it's possible
that i might
go across the street
with a big ol' jug of
round-up weed killer
& spray the words

CRAZY TRAIN

onto his lawn

it's more possible
that i won't do
any such thing

but, the fact
that i want to
do this act of
retarded vandalism
is spot fucking on.

Do you hate me now? No? How about now?

2010-06-24T15:27:00.004-05:00

Oh, I wish I could transcend this fleshy prison. I’m trapped by my perceptions, by the limitations of my senses. I’m an American living in the second decade of the 21st century and I’m probably as sentient as a trained rat. Stimulus, response. Stimulus, response. That’s me. Zap my neurons with a television commercial and suddenly I crave a Big Mac. Tickle my balls with the image of an emaciated supermodel and I have a strange urge to fuck a 12-year-old boy.

Who convinced us these skinny women are sexy? The way their bones stick through their skin makes me think of box kites. I think making love to a supermodel would be like poking my dick into a baggie full of chicken bones. They’re so thin. I’d be afraid my dick would kill her, smash her internal organs into soup. I’d be pounding away at it, trying not to think of prepubescent boys, and her viscera would start streaming out her nose like sausage from a meat grinder.

I’ve been trained, all right. I’ve learned my function well. I’m a consumer, just like you. Patriotism means getting a credit card and maxing the fucker out on cheap electronics made in China. It’s good for America. It’s good for the country to gut the manufacturing base we used to have and ship it overseas where, coincidentally, there are no environmental regulations, no minimum wage laws, and no worker protections. It’s all profit! Isn’t that beautiful? Our factories are empty, leaking toxic waste into the water supply, while American factories in China are stuffed to the rafters with 8-year-old girls making a nickel an hour. They’re running shifts 24 hours a day and the money rains from the sky.

So don’t think about that avalanche of debt roaring toward you. Just watch the latest Rob Schneider movie on your 60-inch flat screen TV. This is the best of all possible worlds and you’re living right in the middle of it.

Yeah, I want to transcend my monkey limitations. My third eye is gummed shut from a lifetime of commercial conditioning. If I could think clearly, if my mind wasn’t a constant clamor of marketing jingles I’d be free to fulfill my potential. I could become Super American. What does Super American do? He builds Wal*Marts in Mecca! Shove over the Dome of the Rock with an M-1 tank and build a super Wal*Mart. A hundred aisles of cheap consumer crap. All of it made in Indonesia by 8-year-old girls. They work a hundred hours a week for a nickel an hour, but they love capitalism. They have to love it or they’ll starve to death. There are no Cadillac driving welfare queens in Indonesia. It’s either work until you drop dead at twenty, or be sold into the sex slavery market. These 8-year-olds think, “I can live my life chained to this injection molding machine, or I can have Rush Limbaugh fuck me in the ass. Hmm, what a choice. I guess corporate slavery ain’t so bad.”

No, corporate slavery ain’t so bad. Neither is dying in a fire. Not when the only alternative is to be gang raped by Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, and Michelle Malkin. Don’t laugh. Michelle Malkin has a veiny, warty, suppurating cock that hangs to her knees. Every year she uses it to club baby harp seals to death. Then she licks the blood from the weeping tip of her pulsating cock. It’s how she stays so fresh and young.

A hundred aisles of cheap consumer crack. Introduce the Moslems to consumer hog heaven. Wal*Marts with minarets. A McDonald’s next to every mosque. Just because I’m an American and just because I know my lifestyle is superior to every other human possibility, I’ll introduce the Moslems to ham and bacon. It’s my foreign policy. Ham and bacon are tasty. If the Moslems would just enjoy a tasty breakfast every morning, maybe they won’t be so cranky. Maybe they won’t want to blow up any more of my buildings. Maybe they won’t crash any more of my airplanes. Maybe I can slip back into my coma. I can stop being afraid there’s a Moslem underneath every park bench. I can resume exporting democracy, dropping 500-lb bombs from the stratosphere onto Third World civilians all across the globe. I can go back to my old life, go back to what I do best—harassing the queers.

Did you think I forgot about the queers? I haven’t. The queers want to be recognized. They want to be accepted. The queers want special privileges. They want some assurance they can live among us without being beaten to death and left hung dripping blood on a barbed wire fence. What’s wrong with that? I’ll tell you what’s wrong with that. The thought of two guys having sex makes my stomach roll. It’s sick. It’s disgusting. It flouts every law of God and man.

Can you imagine a bedroom full of 14-year-old girls fucking each other silly with 8-inch black dildoes? Oh my god, that’s so hot. It would make the highest grossing porno of all time. Of course, we’d have to use 18-year-old models to record the actual video. It’s illegal to use minors in porno shoots. I guess the First Amendment doesn’t mean much any more. But oh god! Fourteen-year-old girls! Their first sexual experiences with each other! Oh, the thrusting! The moaning! Their slender, glistening bodies writhing with each other! Their pink pudenda opening like blossoms! And they flit from pube to pube sipping the nectar there like lithe little honeybees.

But guys sucking dicks? That’s just perverted.

So as you can plainly see here, I do want to transcend my mortal limitations, but it seems I’ll never be able to transcend being American.

probably no title...

2010-06-21T03:12:00.002-05:00

elvis has left the building

dali has been dead
for a long, long time
[& is never comin' back]

it costs too god damn much
to go to the movies

more folks have
fake tits than the
law should allow

i'm goin' to bed.

2010-06-13T16:33:00.001-05:00

retard fun with gumby & pokey #1

hipbilly [sumbitch] | MySpace Video

retardulated haiku collaboration of stupids.

2010-06-09T20:14:00.002-05:00

fresh baked shitsniffart
easily replicated
mediocrity.
***
will rule the people
with their spin-doctored egos
strokin' their pussies.
***
fuck them sumbitches
not just them, but us also
just scribble a line
***

SERMON ON THE MOUNT

2010-06-09T17:30:00.000-05:00

2010-06-09T17:28:00.001-05:00

HOMELESS PEOPLE STORY HAIKU STUPIDS.

2010-06-02T16:40:00.002-05:00

drug addled scaries
wander up & down the street
talkin' to themselves.
***
some are bad crazy
some are just goofy crazy
both are annoying.
***
some live at "godtel"
some of'em live god knows where
some of'em look dead.
***
some of'em try to
pawn their bs fake ass gold
that they "found" somewhere.
***
& it never works
lady at the counter says
"sorry...this ain't real".
***
i don't really care
what the fuck they do, long as
they leave me alone.
***
i believe folks have
the right to be left alone
[so does larry flynt].
***
do not fuck with me
& i will not fuck with you
it's a two way street.
***
well...one fucked with me
started talkin' crazy shit
& pulled out a knife.
***
the pawnshop lady
came to my rescue, & she
shot that fucker down.
***
i kept all his shit
his boone's farm, shopping cart, &
aluminum cans.
***
i showed my treasures
to the other homeless folks...
a lesson of sorts.
***
this angered their blood
there was a homeless riot
against folks with homes.
***
across the country
more & more homeless riots
began to occur.
***
it became so bad
that the only folks outside
were homeless people.
***
then the government
declared homeless people a
terrorisitic threat.
***
"abandoned" buildings
were routinely fire bombed
live on CNN.
***
& fighter jets flew
over central park, killing
hundreds at a time.
***
over a few yrs
the homeless population
rapidly declined.
***
the few that remained
decided it easier
to just get a job.
***
not on their own though
but out of fear of dying
no one wants to die.
***

haiku.

2010-05-29T18:18:00.001-05:00

Bong hit suicide
huffin glue and pesticide
high enough to die.

more shit talkin' haiku than you can handle

2010-04-29T12:28:00.002-05:00

the gongs of bullshit
are more than likely fixin'
to get fuckin' gonged.
***
one by fuckin' one
some of you sonsofbitches
are gonna get yours.
***
self-absorbed fascists
ruin shit for everyone
including themselves.
***
self-imposed stupids
transformed into supposed
linguistic genius.
***
thesaurus bullshit
is something that i do not
want to understand.
***
yr smarter than me
i'm more than o.k. with that
so go fuck yrself.
***
SCORCH THE FUCKIN' EARTH
LIKE I KNOW SOME OF YOU FOLKS
ARE CAPABLE OF.
***

another haiku...[aka] FUCK YOU I'M AN ASSHOLE

2010-04-23T18:46:00.001-05:00

SHE CALLS HERSELF A
HOLISTIC NUTRITIONIST
I CALL HER STUPID.

haiku.

2010-04-23T16:58:00.001-05:00

things are too clear now
i'm seein' 20/15
long live fake dada.

GLIMPSES OF FISH

2010-04-18T21:34:00.003-05:00

BROTHER VIC SWAN ALIVE & WELL IN TEXAS.

2010-04-15T22:28:00.003-05:00

this was filmed in my backyard on april 11, 2010 on my wife's birthday. if this was smell-o-vision, you would be able to smell the pork loin cookin' on the grill about 3 feet away from where this was filmed. sorry, the audio on my little movie camera is for crap.

2010-03-14T13:54:00.000-05:00

AIR IN THE PARAGRAPH LINE #13.

2010-02-26T09:37:00.003-06:00

is now available at amazon, & besides featurin' a handul of other folks, also has a story by yrs truely...REBEL S. NERD.

it's only 10 bucks & you know you want it. if you got one of them stupid fuckin' kindle things, amazon says you can read it on yr gadget in under a minute for $2. fuck a kindle. the physical is where it's at, & we think you know this. least we hope so.

GO HERE FOR ZE BOOK

2010-02-23T08:00:00.003-06:00

Bloomington is where it all started going so terribly wrong, but the seeds of my failure were planted in high school. I wasn't prepared for life after high school. How do you prepare for that? No one told me the things I needed to know, or if they did, I certainly didn't listen. How do you make a kid partake of your wisdom? Especially a know it all smartass like I was. Anything anyone said to me was likely rejected without consideration. I was caught in my own hippie trip. Sure, it was 1985, but in my mind it was 1968. I wanted to protest againsst the war in Vietnam. We didn't have any handy wars in 1985, none that we knew of anyway. Ronald Reagan, Cap Weinberger, John Poindexter, and Ollie North were waging their own little cocaine cowboy shootem-up in Central America, but we didn't find out about that until later. So I had no war against which to hurl my earnest epithets.

So I did the next best thing. I started using drugs. Tune in, turn on, drop out, right? Kick open those doors of perception. I started with beer and then graduated to that great gateway drug marywanna. I found I loved me some marywanna. The more the better. Too much was never enough. And soon enough marijuana didn't have enough bang. I wanted to try the granddaddy of them all, Hoffman's troublesome stepchild, LSD. Man oh man, the feelings those three letters bring up even now, almost twenty years after my last tab. If I had a long weekend coming up and if it wouldn't scare my wife to death, why I'd.... It's best not to think about it.That stuff will rock you right back on your heels and no mistake about it, son. You'll think down is up and up is over there and the Grateful Dead taste like orange Kool Aid. And did you see the phone ringing? You could find yourself wandering in your back yard, your mind a psychedelic riot, staring at the lamplight in your bedroom window, panicking because you're lost. Nope, not for me, thanks. That shit's for young people who don't have jobs yet.

Whenever I think back on that time, I always end up remembering Russell. He was my pot and acid connection. He was an angry tough guy, happy for the opportunity to rap some wiseguy in the teeth. I had a gray felt fedora I'd bought at the Odon Clothing Co. for seventeen bucks. I wrapped a red bandana around it and wore it with my dad's Vietnam era Army blouse. I was so proud of my look. I met Russell one day at the dorm. I still remember his slow appraisal and dawning disgust when he considered my get-up. I'd just gotten my ear pierced, which was quite daring in this area in 1986. I was growing my hair out to here and I felt so smug, so rebellious. There wasn't any rebellion in town, but I was ready to be on its vanguard.

The first time I dropped acid was in Russell's dorm room. He was tripping balls at the time and he bade me to kneel on the floor while he placed the tab on my tongue. I thought that was wonderful. I felt like I was being initiated into an exclusive secret society -- the Golden Esoteric Order of Intrepid Psychenauts, perhaps, daring to go where so many had gone before.

Are you on the bus? Yes sir, captain. Indeedy-do I am, and let's get on with it, mmmkay? There are miles to go before I sleep and miles to go before I sleep and I'll barely even leave this musty concrete block dorm room. Whee-hoo! Further!

It was quite banal, actually, but to me it was fresh and new and so, so strange.

Later Russell was disgusted with me. He kept telling me I shouldn't have let him humiliate me like that. "Never get on our knees for another man!" But I thought my first acid trip should be accompanied by some sort of formal ritual. I didn't feel humiliated.

Later Russell gave me his approval. He said that's how he took his first hit. He wouldn't have done it if he hadn't been tripping so hard at the time. "I just thought your first trip needed some kind of formal initiation," he said. The zap and zing of my neurons responding to that frisson of coincidence, that validation was audible in my ringing ears. Russell approved! I was in!

Some weeks later when my friend Hippie Steve** tripped with me for the first time, I tried to make him kneel as I did so I could properly induct him, but he refused.

************************************************************************************

**Note: I was calling my friend "Hippie Steve" long before I had heard of our mutual friend Hip.

As always,

SAMPLE PAGE FROM UPCOMING BK BY HIPBILLY CALLED 'FISH'.

2010-02-19T23:05:00.005-06:00

[artwork by fake dada] not sure when it'll be done, so don't ask.

the cocky little prick

2010-02-19T14:05:00.003-06:00

I had my yearly checkup today with my doctor. As I waited on the examination table, clad only in my boxers, the nurse stepped in. Oh, but she was a pretty young thing, no more than twenty-four, with a cute little upturned nose, a bright gleaming smile, and everything pert in its right place.

"Lie back on the table for me, please," she commanded, and this is when I sensed trouble. My boxers are slit in the front to allow easy access. It just makes it easier to take a piss at work or to duck behind a door for a quick scratch. It also allows for easy exit when lying on your back on a doctor's examining table in front of a hot young nurse. She turned to consult my chart and I hastily arranged all my manly bits as best I could to hide properly behind the gaping flap of my shorts.

So then this pretty young nurse turned back to me wielding one of those digital thermometers they shove into your ear. When she inserted the probe into my ear, she also thrust her pudenda into my left arm. I was lying there waiting for her to be done checking my ear, feeling her up with my left forearm. There was nowhere for me to go. She had my arm pinned to the table. Her hips fit neatly from my elbow to my knuckles, and I could clearly feel the dip in the middle and a small mound right in the center of that dip. That's when I felt a stirring down below.

"No, no, no, not now," I groaned silently. Immediately a graphic image popped into my mind in full, living color. It was the nurse grinding her hips into mine, moaning with the pleasure of taking all of me as far as it would go, grinding and grinding, groaning and working. Sweating with the effort of slowly riding all the way up and then settling slowly back down so as to feel the full raw power of the pleasure wracking her from the tips of her toes to the crown of her head.

The harder I tried not to think about it, the more intense and real it became. Soon my dick was peeking out of the flap, as if to say, "Hey, what's going on out there? Anything you need me for?"

"No, no," I willed. "Back inside! Get back inside!"

The nurse turned to jot something on my chart and I slapped at my pecker, knocking it down a notch but not halting its fervor. She returned with a stethoscope and spent the next eternity and a half checking my heart and my lungs. Her firm young mons pubis pressed into my forearm again. I gritted my teeth.

This time the treacherous little prick bounced out of my shorts like a child playing in his bedclothes. It stood halfway out of the flap of my boxers and had itself a good look around. It spoke to me, silently but clearly. "You're up to something," it said, "and I'm not leaving until I know what it is."

"There's nothing going on!" I screamed in my mind. "Lie back down!"

"Huh uh," it said. "Nothing doing. No how, no way." It stretched its head as far as it could and opened its one good eye wide. "I wouldn't miss this for anything."

"But there's nothing going on," I pleaded, knowing I had lost the struggle. I felt the fullness down below that announces a throbbing blue-veiner. There was nothing I could do now.

The nurse was done with her stethoscope and pulled the ear pieces down to her shoulders. "Well, you have a good..." Her eyes widened when her elbow bumped my penis in the head. I hoped it knocked some sense into the little bastard. Her face reddened and she turned back to my chart. As she scribbled, her tight little butt twitched in a most lovely manner.

My treacherous little dickhead stood at its full height now, with its hands on its hips admiring the view. "Oh, she's cute, isn't she?" it said, grinning a wide careless grin. "What a peach!"

I reached down and gripped it by the neck. "Shut the fuck up!" I hissed as quietly as I could.

The nurse stopped scribbling. "What was that?" she asked, half turning to me.

"Oh," I stammered. "Uh, what was my blood pressure?"

"I haven't taken it yet," she said. Nice. What else could I do to expose myself as nothing more than a hormone-crazed lout? I tucked my prick back into my shorts to no avail. It sprang immediately back to full attention.

The nurse turned around with a blood pressure cuff and stared directly at my discomfort. Her full lips parted. Her pink little tongue bobbed slightly against her gleaming white teeth. Again, she was just as lovely as a fuzzy dew-dropped peach. She tossed the cuff on the counter and edged toward the door.

"The doctor will be with you shortly," she announced as she fled the room.

I turned to my dick. "Okay, bastard," I said, "now you'll get yours!" I punched it solidly in the head. I hope it saw stars because the pain doubled me over. At least the cheerful little beast started to recede.

The punishment for treason is death, but I think death is too good for the little prick. I have sentenced it to life at hard labor. Every day from now until the end of its natural span I shall work it until it pukes.

It will give me great pleasure.

Homoku

2010-02-18T16:18:00.006-06:00

Beautiful wordage from everyone's favourite 'tarded Limey bastard.

I'm homophobic

I make no apologies

it's my comfort zone

The folks at church said

I don't have to accept you

you deviant freaks

Butt fucking bandits

those ass munching turd burglars

they fucking hate me

Don't lecture me on

political correctness

inverted fascists

I like lesbians

but can't watch gay boys fucking

it's all that cock, see?

Designer stubble

muscle-bound mattress munchers

damp Calvin Klein shorts

His cock is his car

your ass is a one-way street

revoke his license

Hall & Oates were gay

fucked lots of hairy sphincters

I can't go for that...

Gay pride, what is that?

it's the sword of Damocles

not an achievement

Don't dance in the streets

oil up, or blow your whistles

no one gives a fuck

Gay liberation:

the brief walk down a hallway

to a diff'rent cell

Militant faggots

Man, they make a lot of noise

rattling their cages

OUR MOTHERFUCKIN' CHAPBOOK !!!! [first of many]

2010-02-17T22:20:00.003-06:00

GOOD NEWS FOLKS!!! we's got a chapbook sampler available like a motherfucker. has got words by rebel s. nerd, hipbilly [stephen huffman], & fake dada, & it's ready to ship. for $5 you can have a copy [a $10 value...you know this]. this price includes shipping. yr donation helps us fund the forthcoming works of rebel, hip, & fake dada. we'll pack yr envelope full of all kindsa nonsense. promise.

LOOK & SMELL LIKE FAKE DADA'S DUMBASS SELF.

2010-01-30T12:16:00.009-06:00

THE PINK DEMON SHIRT HAS ALREADY BEEN SOLD. SHOULDA BEEN FASTER, YOU FOOL.

THE BROWN SHIRT WITH THE BUTTERFLIES HAS TOTALLY BEEN SOLD ALREADY. YOU SLOWPOKE MOTHERFUCKERS!!!

a few yrs back i made these here t-shirts outta my own 'tarded collages, a copier, & iron-on transfers. i wore the shit outta them. then my body decided to expand a little & the shirts got shoved in one of my 3 dresser drawers.

even though they're used, they're still in fairly decent shape. they ain't nasty, they're just worn. i seen nastier shit for sale at thrift town over on grapevine highway.

each shirt is $10 & will go towards our bk publishing adventures.

you don't even hafta wear'em if you don't wanna. put'em in a box frame like those fuckin' retards at the hard rock cafe do. fuck it.

pink demon shirt is a ringer style t-shirt in the size of large & the transfer is startin' to crackle pretty good. an iron on it for a minute might help save it for a little while.

the brown shirt with butterflies is a large mossimo t-shirt & the transfer be doin' just fine.

that light green shirt is a medium old navy ringer style t-shirt & all is well with the transfer.

ol' blue is a medium fruit of the loom t-shirt & the transfer is startin' to fade a little.

then there's the hunter green shirt in small [more like a small/medium] where the transfer looks almost good as fuckin' new.

somethin' new.

2010-01-25T22:11:00.001-06:00

she said
"fuck miles davis"

so i kicked'er
out of fuckin' car
left'er on the
side of the road
turned up "bitches brew"
as loud as the law would allow
& sped the fuck off.

’77 14 Part 2

2010-01-16T12:39:00.000-06:00

Robert's Cut Rate had it goin' on. I never knew who Robert was, but I knew he was a visionary. His little store had been in Burleson since forever, and was placed almost exactly at the southern tip of the southernmost finger of Tarrant County, which was wet, and the finger touched the shoulder of Johnson County, which was not. Johnson County had joined the Southern Baptist Revolution in dumb days gone by; and like thousands of other counties across the South couldn't seem to grow out of it. What the whole thing amounted to was generations of pious Baptists in rural counties voting 'dry' to keep a clean day face, then sidling next door in the dark for a sixpack. This silly loss of revenue to the poorest places in America always puzzled me. Plus I had to drive a long way to get a goddam beer.

Robert's vision didn't stop at the county line…he cashed paychecks, sold real Texas Barbeque, kept five or six Porta-Potties on the back lot, and had FREE ICE, like the sign said.

I didn't hear Rodent walk up behind me in the parking lot. I was throwing scoop after scoop of 'ice-holes'-- you know, those clear machine ice critters shaped like little elongated donuts – into the ice chest in the trunk of the '67; the sodium lights from I-30 were causing all kind of sparkly ice tracers and tinkly ice echoes.

"Damn, boy. Leave room for the beer."

It sounded to me like, "Ramjoy, Feevormblear," but I knew Rodent's voice. I quit scooping, looked back at him, and said:

"Hey, man, you comin' onto this shit as hard as I am? This shit's crazy."

"Yeah. That Mexican at the counter thought I wanted a case of Copenhagen. Took me three days to straighten it out, with all the echoin' and lights and shit. Now get the fuck out the way so I can put this beer in there."

The Chevy's headlights made blacklight-type effects bounce off the freeway signs. An 'E' on an exit sign would turn into a bird as we passed, flutter into the nearest window glass, then SQUAWK through our heads. Lane stripes wandered off wherever they wanted to.

"You hear that?" Rodent said.

"Yep. And I'm fixin' to put on some Zep so I don't hear it again."

"That bird?"

"Yep. Where we goin'?"

"Get some gas."

"Man, we're most to Waco. Where you gettin' gas?"

Rodent pulled harder right than he wanted; I guess he was following the stripes. We tinked down at least two reflector posts before he got the Chevy straight on the off-ramp and rolled it down to the stop sign. The lights of the Black Stallion Restaurant and Gas Station flooded everything.

"917 exit?" I said. "We're on the whole other end of 917. You come all the way over here to get gas? Say, man, there's a blue wasp in your hair. I gotta piss."

Ol' Thang

2010-01-16T12:37:00.000-06:00

Sortin’ thru my stinky old drawers...here’s one from the bad old days.

I stomped inside
wearing nothin' but
my Tarzan shorts
flip-flops and attitude,
the drunk tank next door
still chorusing,
'Woooooo....put him in here!'
and
'Say, ol' thang!'
I pushed up to
the only bare, greasy seat
on the mattress
and planted my angry ass,
staring at the bar shadows on the floor.
Everybody looked at me.
Corn Nap said,
'Say, ol' thang, that's MY bunk.'
I looked at everybody.
'Fuck You,' I said. 'What are you in for?'
I thought that's what
you were supposed to ask.
And say.
Turns out everybody
ends up asking it.
And saying it.
'Transfer to Huntsville,'
said Corn Nap.
'For what?'
He squeezed thru,
squeezed in,
sat next to me.

'Murder.'

He put his hand on my knee....ol' thang.
I returned the favor,
hand on his.
I got close enough for
him to smell my 48 hour breath.
'Man, I'm 'sposed to be in Dallas,
gatherin' up
'bout 5 pounds of Mexican weed,
spendin' the weekend
in a hotel room
just off Harry Hines
swimmin' in the pool
fuckin' my old lady
relaxin' for a hard week
of skitchin' on pink
hydrochloride rock
sellin' weed
fuckin' my old lady,
and
slappin' little fuckers like you 'cause
they didn't pay off the front on time.'

Corn Nap squeezed back
through the shadows
to the bars
and stared at
the bar-shadow light
over the pay phone
for awhile.
The dude yelling into the phone
with the cord stretched
through the bars
ignored him.

If it hadn't of been for the
big fucker-
they hauled in about 3 am....

I wouldn't have slept on the cigarette butts.

’77 14, part 3

2010-01-16T12:33:00.000-06:00

Texas has a road ID system that I've never encountered anywhere else in my crazy gallivanting. State highways are state highways, county roads are county roads, but we have in-betweens called 'Farm-to-Market Roads', or 'FM ', and there are kajillions of them. I've never researched it, but I assume most of them started out wagon wheel ruts of trails to and from, yeah, farms and markets. I also assume the numbering system started with the first trail that was converted to a state-maintained automobile road, and went on from there. If my assumptions are correct, then I currently live in a relatively old and new place as Farm-to-Markets go…the intersection of 5 and 1187. That or they were some FM buildin' motherfuckers in the day. I'd look all this up but it was easier and lots more fun typing this paragraph.

Anyway, the stretch of FM 917 between I-35 and Joshua meanders up and down and around rolling hills packed with live oaks, mesquites and cedars, fenced breaks of cleared farms and small cattle ranches, through little farts of communities with names like Keene (Seventh-Day Adventist village), Bethel (a water tank, three trailers and a gas station/general store), and Egan, Redneck Central. Egan was where you went to buy that used shotgun or cheap bale of hay you found in the Trader. In daylight. It was not the ideal place to be at 1 AM in a loud hotrod whilst tripping your long-haired brains out.

The headlights of the Chevy looked as if they were too slow to keep up; the orange color of 'em seemed kinda weird too. The passing trees and fence posts individually alternated between standing stock-still and frolicking off into the peripheral with green tracers chasing them. I had no fucking idea how Rodent was staying on the road, but with the constant road show I didn't have the time or concentration to think about it much.

I had completely forgotten about the gas. If you've ever had to urinate really badly while hallucinating you know exactly what I was talking about when I said: "Man, I don't know if it's just a strange gut-rush or real, but I do know it feels like I'm fixin' to piss in your purty black car if you don't get it pulled over somewhere."

"Quit yer bitchin'. Here we are."

"Where?"

"Here," Rodent said, and stopped the Chevy. I jumped out and pissed like a feral tomcat on your favorite doormat. Ahhhhh…I looked around. The stars were all falling out of the clear Texas sky; each one touched a fire on the tree branches around us then jumped fences and bounced into the woods and pastures. It was an irregular Friday night star shower, and it looked good. The dome lights from the Chevy had a warmish glow from between my legs on the ditch, critter eyes were sparkling from there. Spiders.

"Hey Rodent, looky here. Spiders." I finally got my rush or my bladder empty. The sparkly-eyed spiders crawled from the weeds, stopped, shrank from the lights, acclimated, skittled toward me. I zipped up. "Rode.."

"Shusssshhh. The old man's in bed."

I looked around. I recognized where we were. Egan. Back roads of Egan. Egan. The hole part of the ass that is Johnson County. Dale lives hereabouts. Gawd. A feller could get killed just bein' here, lookin' like this. I whispered:

"What old man?"

"The old man with the gas," Rodent whispered…his voice came from the other side of the road. Stars banged off the car. I concentrated.

"Where you at, man?"

"Over here."

I tip-toed to the back of the car.

"Where?"

"Here. Shush."

Rodent was laying belly down in the ditch on the other side of the road, peering across and down through a pair of magical binoculars; magical because the lenses looked like a huge pair of blur-purple sloth eyes with flaming stars bouncing off them. I ran across and plopped down next to Rodent.

"Them is the coolest binocs I ever seen, man. Whatya lookin' at? Does it look weird?"

"Shush. Look over there. See the streetlight?"

I looked. Yeah, there was a streetlight in the woods.

"Yeah. There's a streetlight in the woods. Why you reckon there's a streetlight in the woods?"

"'Cause the old man leaves it on to light up his boat."

"Light up his boat? Does he know there's spiders around here? He should light up the spiders. Fuckin' boat won't sneak up and crawl on him."

"Shush. Godammit Steve, you got to hold your voice down. He lights up his boat so's nobody comes around here and steals it."

I felt spiders on my legs. The stars were a bit subdued now; they started falling behind the streetlight in the woods.

"Say, Rodent, you feel spiders on your legs?"

"Yep. They're everywhere. But we gotta get some gas."

"Gas? Oh, yeah. Gas."

"Come on," Rodent said. He got up, brushed the spiders off his legs, then crouched and tip-toed back to the Chevy. I could see him fiddling with his car keys. The trunk lid popped open, he reached in and unscrewed the light bulb. "Come on!"

...on the subject of fuck-its...[chemical imbalance]

2010-01-16T12:28:00.000-06:00

I got me some brain chemicals that fuck with me. My body produces them in spurts. They tend to peddle me in cyclic spasms of euphoric fuck-its all the way down to fuck-it fuck-its. It’s always been that way with me…when I was a kid I got through it just knowin’- and knowin’ everybody else was knowin’- I was just fuckin’ weird. When I grew up I started self-medicating. I still do. It works; it balances.

’Course, I didn’t know it was brain chemicals doin’ all this shit until a doctor told me so…

It was 2001. I was goin’ through a very heart-tearing divorce, a stressful job that I didn’t feel like gettin’ up for in the mornin’; my swings were mostly leveling down to fuck-it fuck-its. On my birthday morning some morons drove some airplanes through some buildings in New York City. For God. I went to bed.

Three months later I noticed I didn’t have any more rent money. I didn’t even have beer money. And I was still in bed.

"Doc, I cain’t get out of bed. Ain’t no desire. I cain’t stand bein’ around people. They get on my nerves so bad I shake and get all anxious and flee back to bed. And I’m out of money. Matter of fact, you better not cash my check just yet."

"Well, son, you’ve got classic indications of clinical depression. I’m going to prescribe you a goodly dose of ProZombieCrack. Take it for a couple weeks. Give it a chance to even you out. You’ll be normal in no time. And I don’t take checks."

That shit didn’t work. I went back. Doc shifted drugs with the same two week admonishment. Repeat process. Zombloft, Peterdroopic, Wherewithaloft…all the same shit, the same pattern…10 or 12 days in I could function, but they all made me such an unfeeling numbskull I was gettin’ PissedOft all over myself.

"Oh, hip, you’re just not giving these meds a chance. Many a patient goes through a number of these before we find the right drug/dosage balance. Here, let me give you some free samples of the newest one, NumbZac….."

I walked the fuck out of there. If a motherfucker cain’t feel shit he ain’t livin’. Pain included.

Chemical Imbalances

2010-01-16T12:26:00.000-06:00

1863

2010-01-16T12:25:00.000-06:00

...a lil’ memorial day ditty....
I think about this'n this time of year for some reason....and me and Reb were talkin' about history, so:

1863

and this brilliant generation's girls
shrilled with hope then horror
boys marched and starved
and smoked pipes
with each other
and had their guts shredded
across the green spring fields
bled up the winter hills
and
disappeared.
gone forever
with every fucking hope then horror.
and the smoke is still here.
i smell it.

SNH 102106

’77 14, part 4

2010-01-16T12:23:00.000-06:00

Like I said, you never could count on the blotter acid in those parts to be dependable. And for that matter there was a thing about me and acid, anyway. Some trips all I wanted to do was mellow and watch the show; others I turned at some peaking point into a beer drinkin' psychotic Godzilla from hell. You never knew what would trigger me…a perceived bad TV show, a hot beer, a cop with an over-bright flashlight…or maybe a Ninja offering…

"Here." Rodent pushed a paring knife, a crescent wrench, and a greasy shop towel into my hands. The stars blinked off the chrome of the crescent wrench. A spider winked at me from the trunk. I looked up at Rodent. He was grinning.

"What's this shit for?" I asked. In my head it sounded like I said, "Wuussssa thisssa shhhhh foooooo," all echo-y like, bouncing in and out of the Chevy trunk.

"Shhssssshhh," Rodent said. "Weee gottsaa gisss some gasss. SSSSneakk overr tharr behinnnd that shhheddd to the bbboat and grrab the gass tankk."

I already had enough of this echoin' shit. What Rodent was saying seemed important. Fun over, trigger pulled.

"Goddamit, Rodent, speak clear. You're sayin' we're gonna git some gas outta that boat. Naw, you sayin' I'M gonna git some gas outta that boat. What YOU gonna do?"
The echoes were gone. For the first time I noticed the crickets- a symphony of electric cheep - cheeps from everywhere; the woods and streetlight in them were glowing sharp but still; the stars were falling out of sight; the black Chevy had turned swirling purple and smelled like burnt oil. Rodent was still grinning.

"I'm drivin' the getaway car, man."

"Aight." For some reason a mixed up Monty Python skit jumped in my mind. "You're to stay here, and I'm not to sing."

"What?"

"No singin', dude. Hee. Aight. I'm gonna go get us some gas. Here, hold this." I handed Rodent the tools. I put a hand on the trunk lip and pulled a boot off.

"Whatya doin'?"

"Gettin' Ninja, man." I pulled the other boot off. "I get real quiet barefooted." I picked both boots off the gravel and laid them in the trunk. My feet felt every wrinkle and pebble on the road through my socks. The crickets stopped.

"Ninja?" Rodent wasn't grinning anymore.

"Ninja. Keep your voice down. Gimme them tools. Shut the trunk, quiet like. Get in the car, quiet like. If you hear any noise down there, get the hell outta here, go to Dale's house and stay there…I'll catch up later. Shouldn't take me more'n five minutes or so."

The fence between the yards was shoulder high, made of evenly-spaced barbed-wire strings stretched tight a foot or so apart. I was on the property of a brick house to my right; the only light there looked to be a rear bedroom, maybe 60 watts vaguely pushing through a curtain. There were pine trees on the fenceline and scatterings of cottonwoods and mesquites in the yard; all of them had dropped needles and leaves for the wind to move into intermittent piles at the fence. In this summer the stuff should have been crackly but I moved without sound over and through it. My feet tickled. I looked left into the target yard. A cat walked up the driveway into the streetlight. It looked like a green possum. I put my hand over my mouth and snickered. Fuckin' green possum. The cat/possum paused, looked toward me, continued. Ninja, baby.

The barbed wire stopped, butted to the wood of a slat privacy fence that ran on to encase the back of the yard I was in. I looked over. The streetlight hung off a creosote telephone pole at the back corner of the house. Everything here was lit by it, including me. There was an old white Ford pickup parked road-forward under the only window on this side of the house…bathroom window….'she came in through the bathroom window'…shutup, mind. I could see a light shining from way inside through the open bathroom door. A red metal-flake bass boat was hitched to the pickup. In the streetlight it looked like a jillion red stars in the shape of a…uh…bass boat.

I took another look at the bathroom window, tucked the tools in my britches, took two stocking steps between the barbs, over, dropped in beside the pickup. A flailing commotion under the truck made me freeze…BONK, BONK, SCRATCH, SCRAMBLE…the cat/possum tore down the driveway, back to wherever she came from, leaving me some crazy green tracers. Jeebus. Breathe, Huffman. Breathe. So much for Ninja.

I stared at the bathroom window and listened. A cricket somewhere behind me decided things were safe enough for singing. Good enough. I hunched over and creeped to the back of the boat – Creepy-crawly? Where did that come from? Oh fuck, Helter Skelter. I'm on a mission for Charley. Ya know, dude, ya DO have a parin' knife in your britches…GODDAMIT, MIND, I DONE TOL' YOUR STUPID TRIPPIN' ASS TO SHUTUP. WE'RE HERE TO STEAL SOME GAS, NOT CARVE UP A FEW –

I heard a creaky sound from the house. Like a floor board. Maybe an opening window. Maybe just the normal house creak. But a trippy creak from movement. Dayam, Charley, we're busted. Gotta hide. I crept around the boat and ouch rammed my shin into the propeller screw. I'm screwed. The Navy calls that a screw. Propellers are on airplanes. Goddam Boot Camp. Goddam a sore shin. Get someplace…I saw a tool shed behind the house. I ran the gap in the streetlight, turned the corner of the tool shed and ran slap into an open screen door. BAM! Screen door on a tool shed? What the…

"UH-HUH!!! I BEEN WATCHIN' YOR THIEVIN' ASS!!! GIT OUTTA HERE AND TAKE SOME OF THIS WITYA!!!"

Pow.

Zing.

.22 rifle.

Walla-walla-bing- GONE. I took a quick look around and went for the shortest distance between me and shot; the barbed wire.

Pow.

Zing.

"I DONE SAID GIT!!!"

I heard Rodent crank the '67 up and roar out, tires squallin'. I flat-foot jumped the barbed wire…

Pow.

Zing.

My right pants leg didn't swing over quick enough. The top wire grabbed me. Goddam bell-bottoms. And goddam school sports programs. If they hadn't kicked my stoner ass out I'd have cleared that…

Pow. Zing. Pow.

I landed directly on my head.

CRANK

2010-01-16T12:21:00.000-06:00

(Somebody not long ago asked me to put this up if I could find it. Don't remember who, but I bet it was and AHA fan. Those fuckers LOVE reading about loser idiots. Anyway, I found it:)

I woke up from a 2 day crash after a 4 day super-crank blitz. That's basically what I was doing then, mainlining BADASS meth and fucking the whole world up in a
whirlwind, then a crash and burn for a couple days. Repeat process. Kept
the habit up by selling weed. Not a bad deal, partying half the week and
sleeping the rest, other than that shit will kill you in a pretty short
time. Anyway, I woke up from my last blitz/crash with the usual crank
hangover: your head is full of dull painful cobwebs, you're so fucking
hungry that you're nauseous, but you make yourself eat half a Lipton
Cup-a-Soup 'cause you know you're not gonna eat again for a week. Once
you do that first bang food is even more repulsive. No wonder I weighed
in at a buck thirty five or so. I forced the noodles and broth into my
gullet and washed it down with a beer. Now, then, where did my drunk,
skitching ass hide the stash before I smoked three joints and passed out?
Ah, here it is, a brand-new 8-ball bottle next to the pennies and nickles
and pocket funk under a couch cushion. Now, here's what my dumb ass had
forgot---I had bought that 8-ball in Dallas while I was all fucked up and
didn't know how stout it was. I was up to doing half a gram a bump of the
local shit, so that's what I dumped into the spoon. It puffed completely
clear with just a couple drops of water then made the entire room smell
like ether. Oh, yeah. This was gonna be good. I sucked that pretty shit
into my trusty 26 gauge without a little ball of cig filter, it was so
clean. Registered a little squirt of blood, pushed mostly clear stuff
straight into my artery. HEAR IT COMES! That hot invigorating rush that
starts in your throat and tongue then moves thru your head and then your
body. Wait a minute, this is too...awwkkk...I can't breath, the rush is
too intense, I choke hard as it hits my throat, I'm trying hard to get
the needle out before I hurt myself because my muscles are tightening up,
the rush moves to my head and I lose my vision, it looks like I'm peering
thru a fly's lens, all segmented, I feel myself going into a header off
the couch 'cause my muscles are pulling me into a ball, I feel the needle
jab into gristle as I hit the living room carpet. I'm now in a forced
fetal position only my ass is in the air and my face is pushed hard into
the carpet. I'm blind, I can't breathe, sweat is flying out every pore
and I can actually hear my heart trying to pump it's way out of my chest.

I don't know how long that shit went on, but at some point I remember
thinking, 'Dude, your heart's gonna give up on this shit. You're alone in
a fucked-up trailer in Keene, TX. You don't have a telephone. The trailer
park is deserted, it's the middle of a work day. This is fucked up.
Embarrassing. They'll find you with your dumb ass in the air and your
face smashed into permanent carpet burn and a bent needle jabbed almost
thru your elbow like a fag junky who got butt-fucked to death.'

Driftin’

2010-01-16T11:56:00.000-06:00

"Don't let these drifts fool you."

Len stopped the big ol' Chevy 4X4 and set the emergency brake. We were looking up about a 10 degree grade at a snowdrift laying across the rocky old mountain road like a big fluffy snow dog. It looked to be about 5 foot at the hump.

"They crust over hard as a brick during the spring melt." Len got out of the truck. I followed him to the drift. "See," he kicked the drift with his boot. Thump. "You roll up on that dude and you'll bottom out big time."

It was only about my second week on the job. We were on a tour of the mountaintop radio sites that I would have to go to, to repair system outages. It was that time of late spring when there's not enough snow for a snowmobile, but sometimes too much for a 4X4. Len had only been in Colorado himself for about two months, but he talked like he knew what he was doing. Folks like that always make me nervous.

Len looked at the edge of the road where the drift met the rocks cut from the mountain.

"I think we can crawl over this side."

"Whatever you say, Chief."

We walked back toward the truck. I was still at that stage of being awestruck by the sheer beauty of the high country…the blueness of the enormous sky, the expanse of the views, mountains nearby brilliantly glowing white at the tops in the close sun, the thin air full of cool black pine and scents of desolate wildness. A spike mule deer broke from the rocks above and hit the road just behind us – JEEZUS - then BOUNCED over the drift as if it wasn't even there - disappeared.

"Damn," I said. We turned back to the truck. "We oughta saddle up a couple of them dudes for the ride up. Snowdrifts apparently don't enter into their thinkin'."

Len looked at me like I was an idiot. Something caught my eye just past him….a tiny spark of color in a small bare patch in the snow. I walked past Len and kneeled down…the bare patch was only a foot or so round, and in the grey-brown dirt – hell I wouldn't even call it dirt, more like fine, sharp, gravel – was a teensy little purple flower.

"Wow, dude, look at this. Can you believe this? Here we are above 9,000 feet, amongst all this barren snow and rock, and here's this lonely little purple flower in the middle of the snow…"

I looked back at Len. He had his hands on his hips, looking down at me now like I was a SHO 'NUFF idiot.

'I don't do flowers, man," he said.

I stared at the ground for a second. What does he mean he doesn't do flowers? Who don't like flowers? What kinda idiot don't like….I looked up at him:

"What are you, Len, some kinda FAG?!"

He got the 4X4 stuck on the drift. Yup. Fag.

Well...

2010-01-16T11:54:00.001-06:00

In the past three days I've:

*Woke at about 3 AM rubbin' jalapeno juice into my left eye. This is a stupid practice, even while asleep. While I was attemptin' to dislodge the burn outta my puffed-up eye with a cold wet washrag, I did me some thinkin'. "Self," I says, "I know it's always been your policy not to wash your hands after you piss. Anybody with good sense knows that if you don't piss on your hand, then washin's a waste of good soap and water. But next time you carve up some jalapenos for your dinner salad….please….please…piss on your hand before you go to bed."

*Tested the sharpness of my telephone tech scissors with the pad of my thumb. Again. Customers HATE when you drip blood all over their upholsteries. Picky fucks.

*Seen the ghost of Westinghouse. A test cable that I had set on the top shelf apparently decided to uncoil itself by one turn and get its ends all intimate and friendly with the AC guts of a power supply beside it. Turns out my body WILL NOT blow a 15-amp breaker. I saw Westinghouse for a couple seconds, then he morphed into the company secretary, who ran screamin', flingin' papers and shit, out of the shop. I'm thinkin' all my dancin' scared her. But it coulda been the test cable bouncin' off her face.

Now, then. Since I'm retarded, and calculate doin's in the space of calendar years, and know that stupid bad stuff generally comes in threes….

Nope. Maybe fours.

In May or so I was drivin' around the arroyos and dry chunky hills just west and south of Palo Pinto, lookin' for a radio site usin' bad maps and directions. 'Go left hard up a sharp hill. Painted tower. Cattle gate at entrance.' Yup. Thar it is. Typical rutty road on the other side of barbed wire, hawks glidin' around the tower at the top of the hill. Cool.

'The gate lock combo is 4337.' I left the truck runnin'. The gate was unusual in that the electric cattle wire at the top of the barbed wire fence continued on across it, yellow insulators hollerin' DANGER. I logged this information. Uh-huh. I bent to the combo lock and started spinnin' corroded green numbers. 4337. Damn, don't work. Bang the old lock. 4337. Nope. OK. Instructions have been dyslexic before. 7334. 3447. 4773. A breeze kicked up. 7443.

A wisp of my hair moved in the wind and laid on the electric fence. 37..ANGK!!!

I saw Gawd, came to laying against the truck bumper.

drivin' pies.

2010-01-16T11:50:00.000-06:00

(Reprint from the Hippy Steve column at AHA, '04. One of these days I'm gonna finish this series, man. Deliverin' pizzas is just too damn funny. And shutup, dada. I'll have some new shit done for HHC this weekend.)

In April I quit my lucrative government job, again, for the same three reasons I had done so a couple of years ago—I can't stand the suckup political environment and the backbiting that comes with it, I can't stand the creative limits a government job puts on you, and I fell madly in love with a crazy woman. No, wait, this time's not quite the same. Erase the "love" and the "crazy woman" parts. Both of those belong in a pair of trashcans along a fencerow in backyard Alabama, and that's where they are. So make it two reasons. Sorry, I digress.

I spent the summer fiddling with building a couple of websites I envisioned, trying to learn the language of HTML.... all the while fishing my network for a traveling job that had absolutely nothing to do with government other than billing it gobs of money for my time. My websites sucked. My network fishing hooked me a place in a roster of like-minded others, all of us waiting for government funding to open up for pillaging. "Don't worry," the networking waters wrote, "The money will come flying out in July. Uh, August. Make that January..."

Around September I looked at my bank account. "Cheese n' Rice," I thought. I always cuss like that in my mind...pity my mouth doesn't usually cooperate. "That's not enough to buy a pound of good weed. And look at the date. Madre Secar! I couldn't sell enough weed in time to make the truck payment anyway. I gots to go get me a job."

The West Side Pizza Hut sits in a strip mall across a parking lot from a Super-Albertson's; you wouldn't otherwise notice it except it's next to Mindbuster Video. Admit it, those Mindbuster Blue awnings and neon placings in the windows draw your eye... they're fighting the internet tooth and nail.

I already knew the Pizza Hut was there because I had walked the place before Albertson's and Laundromats and Mindbusters were available in Aledo. I tucked my hair under my hat and my shirt in my britches and walked in. The place was cramped, there seemed to be just enough room for the soda machine, a counter, two little bench seats placed by the glass storefront and a lighted menu overhead. I would learn later that there was plenty of room on a Friday night for approximately thirty-five sweaty fat pissed-off customers, five or six flailing skinny drivers pushing through them with orders and a dog or two.

"Can I help you, sir?" a tall barrel-bellied dude asked from behind the counter. He had one of those silly visor caps on...you know, the kind that were so popular with unlikely joggers in the 80s...I looked for his Olivia Newton-John stretchy wrist sweat straps, I half-expected him to break into an aerobics routine while humming "Let's Get Physical". Nope. He just looked at me. Just another poor bastard numbed down to less than humiliation for a management position. The nametag pinned to his Pizza Hut shirt said, "Numb Bastard, May I Take Your Order Please?" Just kidding. It said, "Raymond Beth, Commander of All Things Pizza."

"Do you need any drivers?" I asked. Raymond looked me up and down.

"Well, as a matter of fact, we do. Do you have any driving experience?" I resisted the urge to tell him I had out-driven the Texas Highway Patrol many times across two counties before I was 18 in an illegal '62 Rambler wagon that had an abandoned refrigerator freon tube acting as a throttle linkage. He wouldn't have believed me anyway.

"I've delivered stuff all over the place. Oklahoma to Austin, Saltillo to Abilene."

"I see." He looked me up and down again. "But have you ever delivered pizzas before?"

"No sir." But I've eaten a shitload of 'em. "But I can drive and I can read a map pretty good."

He looked me up and down yet again. Damn dude, do you want a pizza driver or a spanky-boy? He reached under the counter and handed a clipboard toward me. "I see," he said. "Well, fill out this application and call me when you're done." He walked out of sight into the kitchen.

I plopped down on one of the bench seats by the windows and started scribbling. I stopped at 'reason for leaving' my last job. Hmm....shall I tell him I told them to fuck off because they were a buncha numb bastards...ouch, nope. He might take that personal. I scribbled "retired". The phone started ringing. I filled in the Education Section. The phone kept ringing; it was starting to annoy me, phones do that. Now, is it just me, or is it not important to answer the phone to take an order for pizza in a place that sells pizza? Hmm, again. I stood up with my clipboard and leaned over the counter. "Uh... Raymond?" The phone kept ringing. "Raymond?" Ring. Ring. "EXCUSE ME--- RAYMOND!?!" Raymond appeared from the kitchen with pizza sauce on his face: "Are you done with your application?"

Ring.

"No. Do you want me to answer that?"

Ring.

"Oh." He picked up the phone. I went back to my application. Let's see...'How did you hear about Pizza Hut?' with about 15 check-boxes beside canned responses ranging from 'A friend told me' to 'Something I received in the mail'...I didn't see 'A constant barrage of television commercials jammed down my throat since I was a small child' or 'I took a dump there once'. I went with 'Advertisement'. In the background I could hear Raymond taking his order on the phone; in my pizza driver inexperience it sounded like: "Yes, ma'am. Again, sorry for the delay in answering. That's three Super Gonzo Heart-Stopper Specials, Defib crust, a million-order of Hot Wingie-Thingies with extra Slimy Fake Ranch Vein-Clogger Dipping Sauce, two orders of AED Cheesy Bread Product and six two-liter bottles of Mountain Diabetes. Is that right? Good. That will be $4,334, and please have your Amex card and driver's license or ID handy when your driver arrives. If he has no trouble finding your home he should be there in about two days. Thank You."

Raymond hung the phone up. I signed my application under the fine print indicating I would be killed or worse if I had fibbed even a little bit on it.

Raymond looked at me. "Thanks for letting me know about the phone ringing," he said. "We can't hear it back in the kitchen."

I stood up and handed the clipboard to him. "You're welcome. That's not good, is it? Why don't you put a ringer or phone in the kitchen?"

He took the clipboard and looked at me like I wasn't the first retard who had asked a stupid Pizza Hut question. He looked down at the application. "Hmm..so you're retired from the City?"

No. I'm RETARDED from the City.

"Yep."

"Just looking for something to keep you busy?"

"Yep. That and I'm trying to put some cash together for a special project."

"Well, we've brought quite a few retirees to success in our company family. In fact, some of them have risen to great places in our restaurants. I see you've indicated that you're available at any hour. What kind of special project?"

Making my truck payment. Ain't that fucking special? My mind cussing was slipping.

"I want to get my truck fixed up. And yes, I'll work any hours."

"OK. You'll have to take a test first. It's very important that you answer every question right. Look at me. I can't emphasize this enough...I can't hire you if you don't get every answer right." He pulled a worn test booklet and a crisp new answer sheet from under the counter and handed them to me. Oh shit. I sat down, Raymond disappeared into the kitchen again.

The test booklet had handwritten notes all over it-- people before me had considerately used long math on the page borders and circled answers to questions like, "Your store is forecasted to do $5000 in business this week. If it only does $4500, how much blood will your manager have to forfeit, dollar- wise?" That section was easy; I used the notes of those gone before. And then they started with the hard questions:

You notice a coworker taking Pizza Hut property home. You should:

a) Tell your coworker you're going to kick his sorry nonconformist stealing ass.
b) Split the box of mozzarella.
c) Take another toke.
d) Snitch.

A manager tells a coworker to sweep the floor. After the manager leaves, your coworker hands you the broom and says, "Here, YOU sweep it. And tell that ^%$ to kiss my *()^&," then goes and starts making a loaded personal pan pizza. You should:

a) Cram the broom up your coworker's *0^&, then invite him to sweep the floor along his way outside for a nonconformist stealing ass-whuppin' and smoke break.
b) Throw the broom into a corner and confer over the toppings for the personal pan pizza.
c) Take another toke.
d) Snitch.

And so on. Something told me to go with d) on all counts. I did. The phone started ringing again. I signed at the bottom of the answer sheet under Your Mother is watching you sign this.

Ring.

I didn't bother with hollering this time, I walked around the corner of the counter into the kitchen. You should never do that when you're hungry...two stacked stainless steel conveyor ovens were lining up bubbling, browning cheesy garlic smells like upcoming Pavlov discs...

Ring.

"Ylls blink phuns, Rumans?" I slobbered.

The sounds of the ovens and cooling fans were enormous. Raymond was sweating and stretching dough at a table across from the ovens. He grabbed a handful of Italian sausage out of one of the bins above the table. He looked at me.

Ring. I could barely hear it now.

"WHAT?" Raymond yelled. I learned at that instant that yelling would have to be normal up in here.

"YA WANT ME TO ANSWER THE PHONE!?!"

put lotsa water on it

2010-01-16T11:48:00.000-06:00

standin' in the aisle
brookshire's
grocery
gawkin' at cans of soup.
old lady 'bout 80
standin' beside me
doin' the same.

$1.69
$2.29
$3.19

for a little can of dried-up condensed-ass barely tasty soup.

granny looks over at
nobody in particular
says,
"well, i reckon we're gonna hafta
quit eatin'."

"yes'm. i reckon so.'

we rolled on
to the rice and beans.

Zemquotes, part one

2010-01-16T11:46:00.000-06:00

Zem: 'I like your poetry the best.'

Me: 'Oh, girl, you know you're just prejudiced.'

Zem: 'Nope. I'm just smart.'

Me: 'HAHHAAAAHAAHAAAAAAAAAA!!!!'

Tarantula Ranch

2010-01-16T11:43:00.000-06:00

That damn Rio Brazos bridge on the Cleburne Highway near Glen Rose sure has seen its share of goofy shit. I’ve witnessed acid-addled fuckers dive from the top suspensions into four foot of moving water right along with it, for one. But that’s another story.

This ol’ boy from Granbury up one day and decided he was gonna use some of the river land and money his daddy had willed him for a concert/party place. He did it cool: You had to drive forever down rutted red dirt roads amongst the mesquite tangles to get to it. It was cattle-fenced already, and he built a big ol’ steel gate at the entrance. Posted biker guards.

“You ain’t got a ticket? Five bucks for the beer fund, or go your ass back to Foat Wuth or somewhere. Oh. Thankee. Here’s your ticket. Go on in.”

“Howdy, Sheriff, good to see ya. You got a warrant? No? Well, ya cain’t go in, sorry. Wanna beer?”

Perfect.

Ol’ boy had a two-tiered stage built with lighting and sound - thirty or so foot from a bend in the river- a keg cabana with a block-lettered sign in red-

WELCOME TO TARANTULA RANCH

1) NO FIGHTING
2) SEE #1
3) SURVIVORS WILL BE THROWN IN THE RIVER
4) NO TICKET, NO BEER
5) SEE #1

- and a Winnebago ‘office’ planted on a concrete pad for the biker ‘Staff-shirts’ and bands to kick back between shows. With word of mouth, great local bands, and free ticket giveaways in convenience stores over 4 or 5 counties, Tarantula Ranch got to packin’ in a couple thousand crazy people every other weekend in the summer months.

Yup. Perfect. Oh, other than they kept a herd of cattle on the same land. It wasn’t unusual to have to step around a Hereford cow to get to a porta-potty. But folks and cows got used to it.

Anyways, we left there trippin’ one night, a truckload of idiots. We’d played like third in a five band lineup, and during one of our breaks some chick had come around dispensing ‘special’ kool-aid. By our last set the stage lights were starting to look more and more like multi-colored UFOs with every intention of landing on our heads.

We somehow got our amps and boards and shit loaded all willy-nilly into the back of the old Chevy without losing anything or anybody. Chivo banged the last of his cymbals and stands into the side of the truck, stood there for a second or three, then dumped ‘em crashing into a gap between speaker boxes.

“Goddamit Chivo, you’re a loud motherfucker.”

“Yeah. You seein’ what I’m seein’?”

“I’m seein’ double what you’re seein’.”

Chivo rubbed his eyes. “Fuck this. Let’s go to Cleburne and get some chili-tots.”

“You’re a fuckin’ genius. Let’s jee-O. Dale! Mark! Where’d those morons…”

“They’re already in the truck, dickweed.”

We drove off, packed four deep in the cab, weaving our way between drunks and cows. The stars were full out above the mesquites, pinging sparkly tracers off the hood of the truck and the river. The biker guards had the gate chained open, leaning against it, giggling and drinking beer. I stopped beside ‘em and leaned out the window.

“Ya’ll get ya any kool-aid?”

“Moooooooo motherfucker!”

“HAHAHAAAAAA!!! No shit!”

We laughed our way up the rutted road toward the Cleburne highway, cymbals and boxes bouncing and banging. The moon came out.

Mark lit a cigarette and said, “Look up, man.”

The bridge had what we called a ‘lap-lap’ floor; segments of asphalted concrete that caused tires to sing ‘lap-lap-lap-lap’ with accompanying vibrations at 70 mph. We looked up. The moon and starlights flashed between the bridge beams….shadow, light, shadow, light…lap, lap, lap, lap….warm wiggly tracers bouncing on the dash.

“Fuckin’ cool.”

“STEVE GODDAMIT LOOKOUT!”

“Oh..”

Lights were spinning red, white, red, white at the end of the bridge.

“Fuck. UFOs.” I locked the brakes up. The Chevy skidded left, right on the lap-laps, bumped over the bridge edge back to the highway, and stopped.

A cymbal rolled up and dinked the cab. The engine stalled and the headlights dimmed.
Mark took a toke off his cigarette. “What the fuck is that?”

The lights stopped spinning.

Chivo let go of our knees. “It ain’t no cop.”

I opened my door. “I reckon not.”

Dale opened his. “It’s your mama, motherfucker.”

I cranked the Chevy back up and hit the brights. Chunks of Styrofoam ice chest and Coors beers debris were everywhere. At the tip of the headlights was a car on its ass, upside down. We piled out.

“That, my boys, is a ’69 Super Bee with its hemi still runnin’,” said Dale.

“This, motherfuckers, is a shook-up Coors beer,” said Mark. “Crack. Gulp.”

Me and Chivo bent down to the driver’s side. Legs were where a torso should be.

“Hey! You alive?”

Chivo reached in and shook one of the legs. “Hey!”

“Ohhh. Ymmm.”

“Well, kill the motor before you blow us all up.”

The engine stopped. “Gmmmdmm.”

“What?”

A hand came from under the dash and grabbed the steering wheel. “Gmmmdmm brother.”

“What?”

“I said my goddam brother’s gonna fuckin’ kill me.”

the half of it

2010-01-16T11:42:00.000-06:00

the half-moon splays a thing across people’s face
that only displays a half-truth
lies
in the blue white light features are always beautiful
on the one side
and the other finds a place to hide
but as you turn your head
you notice

flashback

2010-01-16T11:41:00.000-06:00

I was just perusing a graduation photo of my navy boot camp company.

My dad found it in a box of old stuff in his closet, and gave it to me over the Thanksgiving holiday. I had completely forgotten about it. It’s an 11X17 color shot of fifty or so kids standing uncomfortably tight in stupid dress uniform; a grinning group face sighing/yelling: ‘Oh, man, one more day and I’m fucking OUT OF HERE.’ It’s matted grey and blue, with a pull-off cover that has the U.S. Navy Seal at the center. All around the seal are signatures and notes like-

To a brother junkie!!! – Roy Manes, Dayton, Ohio

Stay High! – John B, ‘74

To my boy, Huffman – R. Perez, NYNY

Wait a minute. ‘R. Perez.’ I looked at the faces in the photo. There he was, second from left, top row.

Flashback.

Smoke, Coke, and Joke. Two breaks a day, ten minutes per. A 20X20 room stuffed with two companies of chain-smoking boots, six or eight butt cans, and two rattling soda machines. The cigarette smoke is eye-watering thick, the talk din is like a donkey fest, a film of ash makes the black floor tiles grey.

Perez: “Huffman, what the fuck did you join the fuckin’ Navy for?”

Perez is Puerto Rican. He comes from Spanish Harlem, New York. At 23, he is an old man.

Huffman: “To git the fuck outta High School.”

Huffman is poor white trash. He comes from Malvern, Arkansas. He joined the navy three days after his 17th birthday.

Perez: “Oh, mannn. You’re a little hick, aren’t you, Huffman?”

Huffman: “I reckon. What YEW join the fuckin’ navy fer, Perez?”

Perez (grinning): “Beat a rap.”

Huffman (puzzled, furled brow): “Yew beatin’ on somebody?”

Perez (laughing): “No…haha. I beat a jail sentence by joining.”

Huffman (still puzzled): “What? How you keep outta jail like that? They ain’t never let me outta jail ‘less I stayed thar long enough to suit ‘em.”

Perez: “Plea bargain.”

Huffman: “Huh?”

Perez: “Jesus, Huffman. Try to keep up. My lawyer pled my case down to manslaughter two. The judge told me to serve four years in the armed forces and he would reduce my sentence to eight year’s probation.”

Huffman: “Manslaughter two? What’d yew do, Perez?”

Perez (grinning): “Shot a nigger in the face.”

Huffman: “Dayam.”

Zemquotes, part 2

2010-01-16T11:40:00.000-06:00

my

insecurities at times

will

announce themselves

like the edge of an old, ragged
hand-me-down slip

slipping as it were

out from under a new dress

embarrassed.

red.

excuse me.

ol' smitty

2010-01-16T11:38:00.000-06:00

My folks moved from Cowtown to an old ranch house way out on the prairie outside of Godley, TX, while I was in the navy. I’ve often thought they did it just to make me get a place of my own once I got out- they figgered if I couldn’t find them…

It didn’t work. I tracked them down and crashed on the top bunk in my little brother’s room for at least two years.

Godley’s an interesting place. Undulating Johnson grass prairie running off endlessly West; green in fall and spring, dirt brown in summer and winter. The trees are basically mesquite and oaks stunted by the relentless, insane wind, and only reside in the low spots next to the few creeks. I always imagined that there were probably two types of Europeans who first wandered into this country. The first looked around, scratched his noggin, then hauled ass back to “civilization”. Good move. The second stayed, and was whispered crazy in right short time by the desolate wind in the high grasses: go awayyyyy- silence - go awayyyy…

Then got his/her crazy ass scalped and roasted by roving Comanche or Kiowa. Shoulda listened to the wind.

Anyways, being a ranch house on the prairie, there were plenty of semi-feral critters about. One was a mongrel who my little sister had named Gretchen. Mama told me that Gretchen had set up shop in the garage while the place was empty, and came out grinning and wagging her tail while the fambly was moving in. The name, and the dog, stuck.

Gretchen had a tendency to go into heat, and being poor folk nobody could afford to have her fixed. After a litter of pups died of distemper, then another from summer drought and uncontrollable tics and fleas brought on by it, we took to boarding her up in the garage when she puffed up. It was fun, sitting on the porch of an evening, hearing Gretchen’s suitors come from prairie and pastures, sniffing and yowling at the puffy scent moving around in the wind. Coyotes. Farm and cattle dogs. Crazy little feral bastards from the creek bottoms.

My favorite horny dog was Smitty. Smitty was a mix cattle dog from the Smith Ranch, about three miles away toward Cleburne. He was smartest, that Smitty. He didn’t fart around like the rest of them, howling around in the dusk, getting shot at when he got too close. He watched. He knew somebody would let Gretchen out during the day to do her business in the yard. When the human slipped and went into the house for a minute, he’d pounce. Smitty got yelled at a lot, caught in mid-mount, boot in ribs and a thrown stick or rock chaser.

One of those days I put a foot in his ass and hollered, “Gawdayamit, Smitty! You dumb sumbitch! Go to Cleburne fer pussy, like the rest of us do!”

He stopped at the fenceline, like he always did. He looked at me and wagged his tail.

“Dammit, Smitty, I like you. Now GIT. Afore I gotta hurt ya.”
Smitty smiled. I rushed him, grabbing up a stick. He pushed through a gap in the fence and ran, disappearing through the swirling Johnson grass.

“Now, then.” I dropped the stick and put Gretchen back in the garage.

The farmers who eventually settled places like Godley only did so after Comanche, Kiowa, and buffalo were killed down or run off to manageable levels. The ranchers allowed them places of cattle insignificance. The wind still made them crazy. They thought they could plow the prairie for corn. All they did was stir up big rocks from three inches under and knock back the Johnson grass for a season. Then they went away to the rivers.

I tripped over a rock on my way to the barn.

“Shit.”

I landed across another rock on my shin. “SHIT!”

Smitty licked me on the ear. Where’d that crazy ass dog come from? Fucker.

“GODDAMMIT SMITTY, I DONE TOLD YOU!”

Smitty smiled and bolted. I got up. He ran around, circling the pasture like the wind was getting to him, looking back at me over his shoulder.

“Smitty! I ain’t in no mood for your shit. GIT!”

I grabbed up a two-fist-sized rock and chunked it toward him. He turned, toward me, tongue flopping and flapping in and out of both sides of his mouth and BONK. The rock nailed him between the eyes. It sounded like a baseball bat on a watermelon. His eyes crossed, he dug a chin ditch with his legs still running, he fell on his side and stopped breathing.

The wind stopped. My heart stopped.

“Jesus, Smitty. I done gone and kilt ye.”

The prairie went quiet.

“SMITTY!”

“SMITTY!”

The sound of Bob Smith hollering for his dog. It had become routine. When Smitty went missing, that meant he’d gone over to the Huffman place for a piece of that Gretchen. Bob would come rumbling up the dirt road in his big grungy Ford dually, slam on the brakes, fill the front yard with dust, and holler

“SMITTY!”

Smitty wasn’t moving. The wind kicked back up. Dust was coming around the house.

“Dayam, Smitty. I reckon this is a bad day.”

“SMITTY!!!! You wayward sumbitch, git HERE!”

“Well, Smitty,” I said, “I love ye son. I didn’t mean to…”

“SMITTY!!!”

I bent down to pet him goodbye. He was gone. I heard Bob drop the tailgate. Voices came around the house in the wind.

“That’s right, git in thar, son. Set thar. I’m sorry he keeps comin’ up here, Mr. Huffman. But you ain’t gotta worry about it no more. ”

“Oh, he ain’t no trouble. Why’s that, Bob?”

“I took him down to the Vet’s yesterday. Got his nuts carved off.”

FTW

2010-01-16T11:36:00.000-06:00

she’s the

one

with the honey-blonde firefall

and the junebug-colored heart.

she sometimes says
she doesn’t belong
in this world.

fuck this world.

Zemquotes III: kitty porn

2010-01-16T11:35:00.000-06:00

he likes to go
between my legs
and lay.
i make him tents
for just such pleasures..
the tent of love.
he likes when
i rub his nipples.
he has eight of them
you know,
and I get to them all.
he feels it.
he lays on my breasts
his head on my heart
he is my baby
we are together
this is just a love fest
there is nothing sexual.

disassemble heart, 6 years hence

2010-01-16T11:34:00.000-06:00

we separate junk
not junk
cough in the dust
clank,
in the trash can
“ “, no sound
in the boxes
empty it out
leave no room.

no room for
the assistant
toting chunks of life
to the curbs
while he texts
everybody he can think of.

no room for him in this
he cain’t be in this
and he knows it.

no room.

leaning against
the tailgate
elbows on
eyebrows winking up at the sky

‘Well, I reckon it ain’t gonna rain on this load. Maybe just a sprinkle.’

‘Yup. Maybe just a sprinkle.’

we cain’t look at it
too hard
or we won’t be able to move.

HAIKU.

2010-01-16T11:33:00.000-06:00

ately I count the
syllables more than I ought.
fuck you, fake dada.

some crap i found on a yellow paper

2010-01-16T11:28:00.000-06:00

i need to hear trains
it’s the only sound but birds
that makes me happy

africa.
like the sound
africa. af-ri-ca.
strums up sounds
serengeti
drums big beasts
blood breast dances
jungle nursings
mama
yeah, mama.
nobody
wants it anymore.

ugly button

2010-01-16T11:27:00.000-06:00

almost got it pushed today
that ugly thing
thought i’d gotten over that
can’t abide
riptide
hate-anger induced-produced
boiling
roiling
finger figure that
life
aside
myself
provides
pressing
my respect
for an accidental nothing.

when will we learn
that all souls have their problems
we can’t assume
presume
that
nobody
has anguish
but me?

some gushy bullshit

2010-01-16T11:23:00.000-06:00

early this mornin’

there was a
black puppy
on the red seat beside me
the windows were open
and blowing
we looked outside
at the summer sun
sheening the evening
at roads going by
recognizable
but not familiar.

we looked back in.

my mother
and my father sat close
on the driver’s side,
smiling
and busting chops
and kissing.
it was so happy
me and the puppy cried.
‘thank you for giving
them this.
for giving us this.’

i woke up.

i stared at the ceiling
with a wet face
and thought as loud
as i could:
‘thank you for
lettin’ me see that.
even if it ain’t true.’

Swappin' Time

2010-01-16T11:22:00.000-06:00

So, yesterday I up and says, ‘Zems, how old you gonna be in November?’

‘40, goddambitches,’ she says.

‘Oh. It’s about time to trade you in, then. C’mon.’

So off we went to Trader’s Village. There was knife traders and gun traders and book traders – swappers of every kind, but we didn’t see any ‘old lady’ traders. We decided to sit down for a beer break.

‘Well, Zems. Looks like nobody trades old ladies no more. Want a smoke?’

‘Fuck yeah, cumguzzlinsonsawhores.’

‘Yup. SAY…looky thar…’ I pointed to a booth across the way. There was a toothless old man behind a fold-out table loaded with piles of every kind of crap imaginable, including a three-legged possum on a leash. A sign taped to the table said WE TRADE ANYTHING.

‘C’mon, Zems.’

‘Fagnockersslutbombs.’

The old man lit a stinky cigar and looked us up and down.

‘You trade anything, mister?’ I asked.

‘Yupsir, what you got?’

‘Zems, here. She’s gonna be turnin’ 40 soon, and I figgered I’d swap her in fer two 20s.’

The possum grinned. The old man took a big puff off his cigar and looked at Zems.

‘Ah, 40 ain’t bad. What’s wrong with her?’

‘Well, she’s oversexed, she gits confused easy, and her mouth’s defective.’

‘Her mouth…huh?’

“Tell him, Zems,’ I said.

‘Fuckinspermhatsphincterfucker.’

The old man took a step back. ‘Jeez, son. She’s got a real potty mouth on her, don’t she?’

‘FUCKINARIGHTIDOFUCKMUGGLER!’

The possum giggled. The old man turned back to me. ‘Mister, you need to take potty mouth here and git GONE. I won’t HAVE that shit.’

I took Zem’s arm, ‘I TOLD you that eloquent shit would bite you in the ass some day.’ We turned to walk away.

‘Buttmunchcocknose.’

‘Hold on there, son,’ the old man called out. We turned back to him. ‘I won’t have that potty mouth, but she’s got a fine pair of teets thar.’

‘That she do.’

‘Well, look here. Take her home but leave the teets. I’ll trade ya…hmm…these old Mexican porn vids, this here ‘I like Ike’ button, a half-eat funnel cake and….hell, I’ll even throw in Gimpy here…’ He pointed at the possum. The possum sneezed.

I scratched my head for a minute. ‘Now, I’ll allow that’s some damn fine stuff thar. But why the HELL would I wanna tote her back home without no teets??? Come on, Zems, let’s go to the house. This dude’s a goddamed idiot.’

‘Scrotumlickbitchcolon.’

hyphenated arkansas, and a goat

2010-01-16T11:19:00.000-06:00

The road to Lake Catherine State Park was damned attractive for a few reasons: There were generally no cops, and one of the curves edged into a wet county. Beer. ’69 GTO. Switch-backs on a fine-lined blacktop through the piney hills landing up at a semi-deserted ex-German POW camp turned watery, deserted place to fuck up in the off- season.

Strawberry-flavored wheat-papers around seedy Mexican weed. Five-for-five to get stoned. Swing the rope off the 50 foot pine and belly-flop the gars on the surface. Drown the last Pabst or Schlitz under the thunderhead.

“Goddam, boys, it’s rainin’.” JD was the craziest. He’d hunt out a Diamondback and trade kisses.

“Yup. Let’s go.”

Headlights made no difference when the rain’s sideways. Watch the line.

Leeroy had sense. “Slow down, motherfucker. I cain’t see.”

I didn’t. “Fuck you, Leeroy.”

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSssssssssssssssssSSSSSSSSSSSSS OH FUCKKKK the Goat spun left almost ass-wise JD tried to flat track it with a 396 punch back right ditch time flip upside down roof crumblins busted glass scoopin wet red mud and ditch weeds AHHHHH SHITTTTTT

Bonk. Farm fence post. Trees.

“Fuck. Ya’ll aight?”

“I reckon.”

“OH MY GAWD I’M BLIND. I CAIN’T FUCKIN’SEE, MOTHERFUCKERS.”

“MMMrrmm.”

“Shutup, Leeroy, you gots mud in yer eyes.”

i wanna die on a ferris wheel

2010-01-16T11:18:00.000-06:00

yeah...

high

all the carny smells

floating up on my face

ancient turkey legs

sweet corny on dogs

flagrant mustard sticks

spun pinks blues sugars

cigarette smoke and diesel

past butters on

a popcorn sound

down by the lit tents

half the bulbs out

on the arms,

the seat squeaks

like it’s the last

time

every time.

low

thick breath

sweats and pushing

scattered stubs

like gunwads

on oiled gravel

then the burnt tatted

arm

(‘stand back, folks’)

ratchets the rumble

handle to kick up

some hair dust

and make the seat

swivel crazy

feet swing

for the new pass

you grin an

absolute grin

then let go.

there’s a $50 tip in my pocket.

...them fuckin' iggles...

2010-01-16T11:17:00.002-06:00

[ Me and Ulysses got to talkin' about football the other week and I told him this story. Today I was scannin' thru old shit and found that I had written a letter to the editor at Anti-Hero Art about the experience. This is the letter. It's for you Yosep, ya fuckin' Iggle Head...]

Did I ever tell you about the time I was across the river (in ....New Jersey....)

from Veteran's Stadium on a business trip? Probably not. I was there for

a tech. class while I was working for Legacy Comm. out of ....Denver..... I had

to stay thru the weekend, and on Sunday morning the paper reminded me

that the 'Pokes were in town for the afternoon game.

'Shit,' I says to myself, 'I wonder if I could pick up a scalper ticket at the gates?

Badass. Huffman, go forth and experience the nastiness which is Philly.

Get you a big ol' salty mustard pretzel and a Philly-Cheese and about 23

draft ....Olympia.... beers and watch the 'Pokes spank those bird-heads in their

own house. Hell Yeah. Beats the shit out of sitting in this fucking motel

room all day.'

It was decided. I had a couple of hours to play with, so I went down to

the lobby for information.

'Yes, sir,' the cute little motel-person said. 'We can shuttle you over

to Veteran's and back for free. But you might want to check the

weather...'

She nodded toward the glass doors. I looked. Cold wind was whipping the

trees in the parking lot around and blowing misty drops of rain on the

doors.

'Uh, thanks.'

I drove the rental car over to what those Yankees call a 'Package Store'

and got me a case of ....Olympia..... Cans would have to do. Started towards a

fast food joint then remembered that the motel had expense account room

service. The game was on, but my ass would be out of the rain and cold

while I watched it.

The motel room had a big ol' cushiony easy chair, and my ass fit

perfectly. Iced Olympias in a plastic motel trash can next to me, room

service nachos on the end table, a damn good football game on the tube.

Beautiful. Until Michael Irvin tripped up on that piece of shit floor of

Veteran's and broke his shit. I could tell before the camera close-ups

that he was fucked. I had always hated MI as a person but loved him as a

WR, but apparently Philly just hated him, period. The whole stadium

cheered about a man down, possibly dying . 'GOTSDAYAMN!!!' I flung a

half-Olympia at the TV and commenced to trashing the room.

'Damn, baby,' my ol' lady said when she picked me up at the airport, 'Did

you hear that Michael....'

'Yep.'

'What's wrong?'

'I guess I'm just thinking I'm lucky I didn't go to that game.'

'Huh? Why?'

'Cause I'd be dead now.'

thar

2010-01-16T11:15:00.000-06:00

thar’s a hot cast-iron skillet

re-renderin’ a couple

layers of the past

by spoonfuls from the coffee can

in my mouth:

thar’s a cornmeal coat

on a young tomato

dancin’

next to buttermilk

and brother okrie

thar’s a sweet onion

new like the evenin’

waitin’

to blister

cut thick like she likes it

sweatin’ in the warm

top the peppered taters

thar’s pork chops piled

in the fresh salted flour

smilin’

they know they’re last

and they know they’re best

thar’s a screendoor

smoke can breathe through

and a dog

barkin’ about it

zemquotes IV: kittyporn II

2010-01-16T11:14:00.000-06:00

here comes the

little one

assume the position

this is his favorite

way to lay

[lil one left-

embarrassed by

the talking]

he’ll be back

he’ll love me again

all i gotta do

is lay here

both of them like

kissy faces

and the little one

likes a good tail-tug

hard

c’mon love, i’m

right here

c’mon love

my baby

come for boobie

love, lil kitty

get on

the teets

sittin'.

2010-01-16T11:13:00.002-06:00

sittin’ here

the sun crashed

into the comanche hills

and splashed quiet fire

sizzlin’

the clear fork

of the trinity

the crickets fiddle in november

over there

is the rio brazos

.the arms of god.

it cuts the country

from now to cortez

rolls the rocks

it carries dinosaur bones

and hawks with it

the lightnin’ bugs don’t get together anymore

i’d bust every rock

in the brazos

with my bare feet

just

to tell you the truth

to bring the truth

home to you.

The most beautiful obituary that I have ever read

2010-01-16T10:56:00.000-06:00

I found this obituary courtesy of obscure store & reading room.

This man is my hero.

Monday, September 15, 2008 2:05 AM MDT

DOUGLAS -- A celebration of life for James William "Jim" Adams, 53, will be held at a later date.

He died Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2008 at Memorial Hospital of Converse County in Douglas.

Jim, who had tired of reading obituaries noting other's courageous battles with this or that disease, wanted it known that he lost his battle. It was primarily as a result of being stubborn and not following doctor's orders or maybe for just living life a little too hard for better than five decades.

He was born June 8, 1955 in Garrison, N.D. the son of James William and Ruby Helen (Clark) Adams.

He was sadly deprived of his final wish, which was to be run over by a beer truck on the way to the liquor store to buy booze for a date. True to his personal style, he spent his final hours joking with medical personnel, cussing and begging for narcotics and bargaining with God to look over his loving dog, Biscuit, and his family.

He would like to thank all "his ladies" for putting up with him the last 30 years.

During his life, he excelled at anything he put his mind to. He loved to hear and tell jokes and spin tales of grand adventures he may or may not have had.

He is survived by five sons, Jeremiah Adams and his wife, Nicole, Mica Olivas, Wade Olivas, Brice Simpson and Cole Adams; sister, Jerri Giegerich; two ex-wives, Vickie Harrison and Marilyn Williams; four grandchildren; two nieces; and two great-nieces.

He was preceded in death by his parents and a brother-in-law.

In lieu of flowers, he asks that you make a sizeable purchase at your favorite watering hole, get rip roaring drunk and tell the stories he no longer can.

Gorman Funeral Homes - Converse Chapel of Douglas is in charge of the arrangements.

Seriously. Three hundred dollars a week.

2010-01-16T10:55:00.000-06:00

Two days ago, a battered teal Cavalier pulled into the pawnshop parking lot. A beefy blonde with a sweat stained shirt and dead eyes got out and shuffled up to my counter.

"I stopped cause your sign says 'GOLD'" he said.

"Okay."

"My root-canal fell out of my head. I can't have it put back, because my tooth broke with my root-canal. My root-canal is made of gold. Your sign says 'GOLD'."

He dropped a gold crown into my hand. It was full of rotten tooth. I looked at Aunt Cheryl and saw her standing behind the gun counter, red-faced and silently laughing.

I dropped the crown on the gold scale and calculated the value. "Your tooth is worth $12."

"What? Twelve dollars? Gold is worth eight hundred dollars. I saw it on TV."

"Yep. Pure gold is worth eight hundred dollars an ounce. What you have here is dental gold, which is 12 karat gold. And you only have two-point-two pennyweights, so your tooth is worth twelve dollars."

"Give me back my tooth."

Please publish my book. I make three hundred dollars a week, and I have to weigh people's teeth.

It Seems Inevitable That I Will Be Stabbed To Death By A Mental Patient

2010-01-16T10:54:00.000-06:00

When Michael takes his meds, he is polite and soft-spoken, even meek. When he visited this week, it was clear that he was not taking them. He ran inside, straight to the coffee pot, taking care to pour equal amounts into the floor and his styrofoam cup.

"REBEL! GIB ME A CIGARETTE!"

"What did you just say," Cheryl asked.

"NOTHIN'. I WAS TALKING TO REBEL."

"Michael, I don't know where my cigarettes are, and I'm busy right now."

"NEVER MIND."

He walked outside and rolled his own from a tobacco pouch tied to his belt. He smoked fast, bracing himself against the frigid wind, and tossed his butt into the street.

He came back inside and announced to no one, "I"M JUST WAITIN' FOR THE BUS!"

When no one replied, he walked from person to person, customers and employees, repeating his announcement, "I'M JUST WAITING FOR THE BUS!"

The store was filling up, and we made three pistol sales in as many minutes. As I was explaining the criminal history check to a buyer, Michael pulled the 12-string Epiphone from its hook, sat on a stool next to my customer, and started playing. He tried to cover his lack of talent with enthusiasm.

"BLUE MOOOOON! I SAW YOU STANDING A...."

He was cut short by a withering glare from Cheryl, and decided to wait for the bus outside.

I am supposed to order Michael a Smith & Wesson knife with a 10" blade when he gets his disability check. I feel certain that his first act upon purchasing this knife will be to stab me in the throat with it.

I’m Holding Out For A Hero

2010-01-16T10:52:00.001-06:00

I recently woke up on the couch at 3 am. Everyone else was asleep, so to entertain myself, I bought a filmstrip projector from the 60's for $20. At that price, it was a bargain. It came in a Samsonite suitcase, complete with turntable, microphone, and the little clicker you use to advance the filmstrip. The movie projects onto the lid of the suitcase.

I don't have to explain myself to you. Trust me, it was a badass investment for $20.

The next order of business was to buy myself some filmstrips. After some serious ebay trolling, I found a lady that was willing to sell me 250 filmstrips from the 40's to the 60's for $15. That's right, 250 filmstrips for $15. I got them in the mail yesterday, and I dumped them all in the floor so to better glory in the awesomeness of my purchase. And let me tell you, there are some doozies, like "Meet Your Mailman", "Mexican Children", "How Clothes Affect Your Good Health" (starring a creepy doll with a massive wardrobe), and a couple of those Disney safety films that star Jiminy Crickett as your helpful narrator.

I set up my projector, selected "Meet Your Mailman" (1949) for my viewing pleasure, and sat down to watch. That's when I realized that I didn't not have a fucking clue as to how to load the filmstrips into the projector.

"No problem," I think. "I don't need to know how to do it, the internet knows."

Well, friends and neighbors, the internet thinks it is WAY too cool to play with ancient technology like an ELBA filmstrip projector. Not a single mention of it.

"Fuck it," I thought. "Who needs the internet when you surely know someone that was in the A/V club in school?"

I'm holding out for a hero to help me redeem my $35 impulse purchase. Are you the A/V nerd of my dreams? I fucking hope so. I've got 250 filmstrips to learn from, and time is ticking.

’Cause the boys in the hood is always hard

2010-01-16T10:50:00.001-06:00

I answered the phone the same way I always do.

"JJ's Pawn, Lazyman Tools, how can I help you?"

"Yeah. I need to ax you a querstion. If like, I like, bring somethin' up there to you, like, do I need to have a driver's license or something like that?"

I could tell that he was from the pawnshop side of town.

"Yessir, you need a state issued license or id to pawn or sell to us."

"Do you keep it?"

"No, I don't keep it."

"What do you do with it?"

"I type the information in the computer."

"How long does it take for you to give it back?"

"About two and half minutes."

"What I mean is, like, how long do I get to pay back the loan?"

"So...you're not talking about your identification? Yes, I keep your item. It's a thirty day loan, but you actually have ninety days to pay it back, but you pay the finance charge for every month that you keep the item in pawn. The finance charge is set by the state, and it is based on your loan amount."

"Oh...well, I'm gonna be up there in like, fifteen minutes. I'm gonna bring you something."

"Hold on. What are you bringing me?"

"A deuce-deuce." (for those of my readers that aren't down with the gangsta raps, a deuce-deuce is a .22 caliber pistol, as when the late, great Eazy-E rapped, "the silly motherfucker pulled out a deuce-deuce". One way or the other, he's a bad brother, word to the motherfucker)

"We like to let our customers know that when they pawn a firearm, ATF requires that they undergo a criminal history/background check when they come to pick up their firearm."

"....What do that mean?"

"That means that if you cannot pass a criminal history/background check, I have to keep your gun."

He hung up. I wish I had told him to bring me a nina (rap slang for a 9mm pistol, see Dr. Dre's "and if I got my nina then you know I'm straight trippin'.")

P.S. Please excuse my extended absence, I've had my hands full, bustin' caps in asses. But, if you're just dying to see what it looks like when I edit a story, follow this little link. While you're there, check out the other guy's stuff. Unless you're easily offended. The Others like to use the bad swears.